Connect with us

The R Word - Documentary Film Project

We have been called “village idiots”, “imbeciles”, “fools”,
“sub-humans” and “retards”. We have been thrown to the wolves,
incarcerated in prisons and institutions, abused and even murdered in
foster homes, rooming houses and streets across the country. We have
been feared and misunderstood for centuries. We are people with
intellectual disabilities. This film – “'The 'R' Word - but names will always hurt you'”
– chronicles the incredible struggles of people with intellectual
disabilities and their families to be recognized and treated as fully
human with the same rights as anyone else in society. Beginning with a
brief examination of the history of their oppression, we see how the
fears and superstitions of the middle ages, with their creation and
isolation of the “village idiot”, culminate in the policies of Hitler
and the eugenics movement. And how vulnerable these beginnings have left
people with intellectual disabilities right up to the present day. We
do this by revealing personal histories over three generations - of
families and individuals, their incredible stories of courage,
vulnerability and love. The film will also look at the not so pretty
side, where individuals are abandoned and neglected by family and
society left to suffer and die in isolation.

We come out of these stories with a new understanding of the
urgency to create conditions where all people can maximize their
potential without fear of discrimination and dehumanization and how that
process in turn makes us all more fully human.

Pierre Tétrault is the writer/director of the documentary called “This Beggar's Description”
for the National Film Board of Canada which was released in the spring
of 2005. It tells his brother's story – one of art, love and madness –
capturing the far-reaching effects of schizophrenia, on one man, his
family and his friends. It had its world premiere at the Montreal World
Film Festival in 2005 and has been seen in numerous film festivals in
Canada and the States winning the CBC Newsworld Award for Best
Documentary at the Victoria Independent Film Festival 2006 and the
Calgary Picture This Festival 2007 as well as the Schizophrenia Society
Of Canada's Media Award 2006. It is now being aired on the Documentary
Channel. He is also a director of fiction having directed Doris Rajan's “Healing Rani”,
a half hour comedy for television recently released that had its
premiere at the New York International Independent Film Festival in July
2007. Pierre was also executive producer and co-writer of “Crack Diary”, a half hour drama that aired on CBC, TVO and Bravo.

Contact Pierre Tétrault Media Inc for more information or to order copies: Doris Rajan - Producer: d.rajan@rogers.com or fill out this order form.